Journal Number 96
August 2005

EDITORIAL

From Our "No Flowers Please" Department
By Ian St George

For sale (US$11,971.25 if you are interested) a letter from Charles Darwin (1809-1882), dated 27th January (no year), politely putting off a woman who must have sent him orchids for research:

"I will not attempt to thank your Ladyship for all your kindness, for it is beyond my power. I am pleased to hear that my Books have at all interested you: but I fear my little Orchid book will be dry. This summer when at the sea, I meant merely to write a paper for some scientific journal, but the subject grew on me till my MS. got rather too long for a paper. I am convinced that orchids have a wicked power of witchcraft, for I ought all these months to be working at the dry old bones of poultry, pigeons and rabbits instead of intensely admiring beautiful orchids. - I mention all this, because, though I can hardly bear to write the words, I must beg your Ladyship not to send any more of your treasures; though perhaps at some future period I may indulge myself with the examination of a few more orchids. - I will not forget your Ladyships most generous offer to give me other flowers, if I require them for observation, & I have no doubt that I shall some time be a beggar again."

In 1862 he first published: "On the Various Contrivances by which British and Foreign Orchids are Fertilised by Insects".

Darwin experienced 40 years of intermittent vomiting, pain, headaches, lethargy, skin problems, and depression after disembarking from the Beagle. Twenty doctors couldn't diagnose him, though most concluded it was psychosomatic. The Postgraduate Medical Journal (2005; 81: 248-51) now suggests he had lactose intolerance. Not only was there a family predisposition to the same problems, but Darwin got better only when by chance he stopped taking milk and cream. No wonder he was so mysogynously condescendingly grumpy.